Model Legislation: Nullify Obamacare in 4 Steps

There are four main steps that should be taken to nullify the Affordable Care Act on a state level. While each one of these steps alone won’t result in a nullification of the act nationally, they’re all an important piece of the puzzle. An act of resistance in one state leads to courage and doing the same in another. At the same time, some courageous types might get the notion that they can turn it up a notch and take a stronger stand in their state than you have in yours.

Step 1: Ban State Enforcement, Participation and Material Support

Passage of legislation to ban your state from enforcing, assisting, participating or providing material support to the Affordable Care Act will put it on even shakier ground than it already is. The federal government relies on state assistance to carry out the act, and this sweeping legislation would ban such participation in every current – and potential future – way. Based on the long-standing legal principle of the “anti-commandeering doctrine,” even the Supreme Court has always held that states cannot be forced to implement or spend money to carry out federal acts or regulatory programs.

In short, this puts the implementation and cost of the ACA back in the hands of the federal government, who is barely even able to operate a website. As Judge Napolitano has recently pointed out, a number of states taking this action will have the effect of “gutting Obamacare.”

Step 2: Reject Medicaid Expansion

As envisioned by ObamaCare’s authors, the Medicaid expansion would account for roughly half of the law’s $2 trillion of new entitlement spending over the first 10 years. After the Supreme Court blockedCongress’ attempt to coerce states into implementing it, however, 25 states refused to do so.

As a result, those states have already defunded almost a quarter of ObamaCare’s new entitlement spending. They are also helping to increase dissatisfaction with the law among hospitals and other providers, who now won’t be receiving the subsidies they were promised in return for their support.

If Cruz, Lee, FreedomWorks, Heritage Action, Club for Growth and the rest really want to defund ObamaCare, they should be fighting to block the Medicaid expansion in the 25 states that have already authorized it.
(via Michael Cannon @ Forbes)

Step 3: Protect Residents from Mandates

The insurance mandate serves as the cornerstone of Obamacare. Whether you call it a fine or a tax, the underlying purpose is the same: force people to purchase government approved health insurance.

While it may seem impossible to stop the draconian IRS enforcement arm, states can take significant steps to protect their residents by minimizing the impact of the mandate.

States can create an offsetting state tax rebate to compensate citizens who choose not to purchase insurance through the federal system and get hit with the Obamacare tax/fine.

States can prohibit city/county clerks from enforcing any IRS liens resulting from nonpayment of Obamacare fine/tax.

States can prohibit state-chartered banks from enforcing any IRS liens resulting from nonpayment of Obamacare fine/tax.

State that did not set up a state run exchange can actually block the IRS’s illegal ObamaCare taxes legislatively by suspending the licenses of insurers that accept the illegal subsidies. Since no insurer would then accept one, not a single employer in the state could be hit with the employer-mandate penalties those subsidies trigger.

Step 4: Challenge the IRS’s illegal ObamaCare taxes

34 states that have banned the creation of state-run exchanges under the ACA. The federal act authorizes Exchange subsidies only through state-established Exchanges, not the 34 Exchanges created by the federal government, or those created in a partnership. As a result, those 34 states that refused to establish Exchanges by law have defunded a further one-third of that $2 trillion dollars. Since those subsidies trigger penalties under both the employer mandate and individual mandate, those states have by law also exempted all of their employers and about 8 million individual residents from those penalties.

Unbelievably, contrary to the clear language of the statute and congressional intent, the IRS is trying impose those taxes and issue those subsidies in those 34 states anyway. The IRS is literally trying to tax, borrow, and spend more than $700 billion without congressional authorization – a more egregious example of taxation without representation than the Stamp Act.

State attorneys general, employers, and individual taxpayers have so far filed four lawsuits challenging those illegal taxes. A federal judge has rejected the Obama administration’s attempt to dismiss the challenge filed by Oklahoma attorney general Scott Pruitt. More than a dozen Indiana school districts filed suit alongside that state’s attorney general Greg Zoeller.

If anti-ObamaCare groups really want to defund the law, they should get governors, attorneys general, employers, and their own members to file additional challenges.

If your state has not yet banned exchanges, has only not implemented them by a declaration of your governor, or is running exchanges when it shouldn’t, contact your state legislators to introduce the following bill to ban their creation and operation by the state.